Note the third map, "Green Lake" is an extension off the righthand edge of the second map, "Snippetsvilledist" map. Also note that there is an overlap which you can identify with the Green River and the Roadhouse showing on both maps.

WSO the problem with using WH's map is it would be moving away from Alex's original concept. - Remember I spent an extra couple of hours redrawing to meet those criteria - The solution is for an artist to download my maps and color them with the topographical information. Any volunteers contact WSO and arrange to do this task.

And I'm trying hard not to smother everyone with all the extraneous details that need to be looked into.

There's only one other big (all involved) job after this Mapping discussion. That's the Setting Database. Sorry if it's scaring anyone off. But actually, half the fun in the project is in the planning and if the planning comes together as I expect it too, it's going to have an awesome end result.

Originally posted by jon.hayworth WSO the problem with using WH's map is it would be moving away from Alex's original concept. - Remember I spent an extra couple of hours redrawing to meet those criteria

Jon, the Map of Oakridge is an actual topographical rendering of a real location -- obviously, it isn't going to match exactly with Alex's original vision. -- However, the advantage is that I can produce a similar map in about five minutes for some location in the Western US that matches the concept closer than my home town does (if someone can suggest one.)

The concept can be adjusted to fit and/or the real location modified in my map program before rendering as an image.

I WSO's point is that the way the program renders images it makes Snippetsville more of a "real place" that authors can picture in their minds better.

I'll play with the program a bit and see if I can find some real Topographic features to set your layout into and combine all of your hard work with the aerial view the program can render.

Originally posted by jon.hayworth Note the third map, "Green Lake" is an extension off the righthand edge of the second map, "Snippetsvilledist" map. Also note that there is an overlap which you can identify with the Green River and the Roadhouse showing on both maps.

WSO the problem with using WH's map is it would be moving away from Alex's original concept. - Remember I spent an extra couple of hours redrawing to meet those criteria - The solution is for an artist to download my maps and color them with the topographical information. Any volunteers contact WSO and arrange to do this task.

jon

I would like to take the drawings and make a map of them. It can be cut into sections, but would be most useful if it was just emailed to the authors. I'll give it a go.

I'm slightly in awe of the talent being displayed here, cartography being an interest of mine. I have no problems with the Snippettsville layout in itself, nor the location and layout of Green Lake now that Jon has redrawn his initial effort, for which, Jon, my sincere thanks.

My only concern now is the Snippettsville/Interstate relationship. In my original intro to our little town, I said "...some of the truckers leaving the city have passed the word around that it's well worth the ten-minute detour from the Interstate for one of Hannah's breakfasts." How far would that mean? I would expect that a trucker would be disinclined to leave a main route for a secondary one, even for something special. Perhaps Snippettsville needs to be just off a looping road which re-connects with the Interstate? (Think capital 'D', where the vertical bar is extended in both directions - that's the Interstate. S'ville would be just off the loop of the 'D'.)

For anyone worried about ratings, I think dr_mabeuse said it best - "A moment's reflection on pop music, fast food joints, and prime time TV should prove to anyone that the correlation between popularity and quality is tenuous at best."

Originally posted by Alex De Kok My only concern now is the Snippettsville/Interstate relationship. In my original intro to our little town, I said "...some of the truckers leaving the city have passed the word around that it's well worth the ten-minute detour from the Interstate for one of Hannah's breakfasts." How far would that mean? I would expect that a trucker would be disinclined to leave a main route for a secondary one, even for something special.

Since I just happen to hve a brother who is a commercial truckdriver and a best friend who was one for a while, I can set your fears to rest -- A "ten minute detour" could be as much as forty or fifty miles of secondary road or "business route" as long as it only adds ten-minutes to the total travel time from point B to point B.

Truckers often do take secondary roads for as much as two or three hundred miles if they will save time, distance, or fuel over staying on the Interstates.

For a really good deal, A trucker who is near the end of his allowable driving time might go fifteen or twenty miles out of his way before stopping for the night -- say to spend the night in a real bed with a willing woman instead of sleeping in the "sleeper" of his truck -- Sleepers aren't as cramped as most people might think, but they're far from being as nice as a "real bed."

I found a couple of usefull areas in my map program, that while they don't match Jon's layout very well, might be useful for non-americans in visualizing Snippetsville's relationship to interstes, primary roads, secondary roads, and other roads.

I'll post them in few minutes.

Quote:

I'm slightly in awe of the talent being displayed here, cartography being an interest of mine.

In my case, it's not so much skill as having a good map program for topographical features.

This map is of the area near Salem Oregon where I was born and live for the first two years.

I'm not sure the two blue labels survive the resizing legibly.

The top one is the town of Turner, Population approx 2,500 when I was born in 1949, but currently about 5,000 as it's become a "bedroom community" for the the State Capitol in the upper right corner of the map. Turner was established as Railroad Town, but it also had a an operating Sawmill through the mid-1950's.

The bottom blue marker is Scio, a smaller town where my Aunt and Uncle lived for several years -- until 1965 or so -- which also had a sawmill, but was mostly was and is a farm town of about 1,500 even with the bedroom commuters included.

The City in the lower right is Albany Oregon, home of an International Paper "kraft paper" plant. Even with modern environmental protection regulations the plant can be smelled thirty miles away if the wind is right. Before the emissions were cleaned up, it could sometimes be smelled as much as 70 miles away! IIRC, Albany would almost qualify as a "small town" at Pop. 75,000 or so.

Originally posted by Weird Harold The top one is the town of Turner, Population approx 2,500 when I was born in 1949, but currently about 5,000 as it's become a "bedroom community" for the the State Capitol in the upper right corner of the map. Turner was established as Railroad Town, but it also had a an operating Sawmill through the mid-1950's.

A Close up of Turner.

If it was turned 90 degrees, the street layout is close to Ron's layout, but the terrain doesn't match.

Originally posted by Weird Harold The bottom blue marker is Scio, a smaller town where my Aunt and Uncle lived for several years -- until 1965 or so -- which also had a sawmill, but was mostly was and is a farm town of about 1,500 even with the bedroom commuters included.

A close-up of Scio, for an idea of how small town streets are commonly laid out. The last time I was in Scio, there was an average of about one house per block except near the city center and couple of new housing developments on the outskirts. At that time, Scio had one combination gas station/convenience store, A grocery Store, a town hall and a post office.

It never did have much more than that but there a Company Store, A Feed Store, and a hardware Store -- among other small businesses -- when the Sawmill was operating in the 1940's and 50's. All of those businesses closed or faild when the Mill closed and the roads into Salem and Albany were paved so it wasn't an all day trip to go into the "big city" for supplies.

This map is of the Goshen Junction/ Willamette Highway Junction, wher OR58 meets I-5. OR58 is one of those secondary roads that Truckers use in preference to the freeway because it's fifty miles shorter to most destinations (and fewer weigh stations) than taking the Interstate.

Originally posted by Weird Harold This map is of the Goshen Junction/ Willamette Highway Junction, wher OR58 meets I-5.

This map is a close up of the towns of Dexter and Lowell, populations 400-500 and 1,500-2,500 respectively.

At one time, Dexter had a very fine restaurant that attracted a lot of Truck traffic, although it has been closed for many years now.

The Causeway across Dexter Lake to Lowell features one of the few surviving covered bridges -- one of only three, IIRC -- although it's been closed to traffic for about 20 years now since a stronger bypass bridge was built inthe 1980's.

Dexter is a farm town and used to have a rodeo grounds where the regional 4-H fair was held annually.

Lowell as it is shown on the map is relatively new as small towns go -- it originally was located where Dexter Lake is now, just north and east of the coverd bridge at the south end of the causeway. The entire town was relocated when the Dexter Dam was built in the 1950's

I picked Dexter as an example, because it's located near an interstate, a lake, and illustrates how several small towns might be located in relation to each other.

Everyone is way ahead of me, but having had a look at the original maps, I have two comments:

Radio Station: Where a radio station IS, is on the air. Most small radio stations don't have their own building. They’re usually upstairs, above some other business. In the case of the city where I now live, the radio station was above a clothing store, then a bank, and now the top floor of the local television station. The transmitter is on a high ridge above town. When it was bought by the company which owned the television station, moved the radio transmitter to the highest point in the county (where the TV transited already was) and one thousand feet up the television antennae.

Originally, studio and transmitter were connected by land lines, these days, by microwave relay.

What the map shows is not wrong, I would merely put something else on the ground floor.

Green Lake: In my opinion, the lake is much too regular. I would rather see it as a small central area connecting a surrounding group of bays, coves, and inlets where rivers and creeks enter.

We already 'know' - if one story is used - that one area has a hiking trail on a high bluff overlooking the lake.

There should be some islands, rocky points, and dangerous shallows, as well as at least one area with a fairly accessible beach. My reason for suggesting this, is so that one should not be able to see where someone is, on the lake, with a single scan of their binoculars.

This is not a problem of cartography, rather it is a suggestion arising out of literary considerations.

Although WSO is never going to let it in as an official story, as it possesses not a scintilla of eroticism, check out "The Legendary Boater" as an example of the effects a large, irregular-shaped, island and rocky point strewn, lake with several inlets and bays can afford the writer.

Think of the lovers who miss their rendezvous. Think of the boaters who come aground, or worse, sink, and end up keeping each other warm. This is why I want Green Lake to be both irregular and just a bit dangerous for the novice boater.

That is the kind of body I would wish Green Lake to become.

As a movie image, "On Golden Pond" is a popular vision of what Green Lake should be like, seen from the cottagers' point of view.